13 Months

Jill turned 13 months old this week, which is also the week when Seattle moved to the face of the sun. I don't even have words to explain how miserably hot it has been, but it's slowly cooling off.  It's 94 right now, which is down more than 10 degrees from yesterday.  We caught 107 in the car yesterday.  YUCK!  

At 13 months Jill is saying more words, including: cake, milk, cookie, up, cup, cheese, poop (my favorite), and hot.  She's also showing a great deal of interest in walking, but she still lacks confidence.  She wants to cruise around the house holding only ONE of our hands (like a big girl) looking at everything, and the stroller has become much less interesting than walking with MaMumMum or Dada.  She has taken a few steps on her own between objects, but she'd rather lean out really far and risk falling than take those scary steps most of the time.  Everyday brings her closer to doing it on her own, though.  Jill has decided that the high chair is a thing of the past so we bought her a booster seat so she can sit at the table with us (which she always did in her high chair anyway) and she loves it.  She pulls herself up on her chair and tells us, "Up!" all day long now.

Other than that we march onward much the same as before.  Our days are filled with reading, singing, playing, tv watching, wading, bathing, and fun.  Life is good around here!

big girl in the booster seat

naked girl in the morning

smiling at her adoring fans at Red Robin

keeping cool at the water table

an impromptu dip in Henny's pool

reading with Dada after her nap (check out her crazy hair)

the new farm she bought with birthday gift cards (Thanks Erin and the Schultz family)

tasting pork for the first time

crawling to her favorite playground

getting the granola bars

taking them out of the box, then putting them back in = endless fun

PB&J

Jill is now a big fan of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on toast.  Check her out!

391

Today Jill is 391 days old--(I did the math when a woman at Azteca told me her son is 18 days old.  I don't normally know how many days old Jill is at any given time.).  We spent the day with my grandma today and had a great time at lunch and playing at home.  Thanks for coming, Grandma!

Growing Up

Jill has changed a LOT in the two weeks since her birthday. She now repeats nearly everything she hears, and can say and do lots more things on her own.

New things we like:
*saying "duck" (along with clicking her tongue, which is her way of quacking--my genius baby figured this out on her own!)
*grabbing her toes when I ask where they are
*grabbing her nose when I ask where it is
*sucking her toes on command
*fake sneezing
*walking without help when pushing her stroller
*going to the pantry, pulling out the container of animal crackers, slapping it until it gets opened, then reaching for one herself
*drinking organic vanilla soymilk with reckless abandon
*drinking out of bigger girl sippy cups
*being willing to try dinner off of our plates, but she still insists upon jarred meat/veggie mixes of baby food

New things we don't like so much:
*clinging to Mama and screaming whenever Mama can't pick her up--NOT FUN
*waking in the middle of the night for 1-2 hours, screaming (sleeping through the night lasted less than a week)
*fighting being put to sleep, needing to be rocked still, but not wanting it (why, oh why did I EVER think rocking was a good idea?)
*whining, oh the incessant whining (some days)

As usual, the good far outweighs the not so good, so we're happy, if a little sleep deprived.

Here are some photos and videos. Enjoy!

Guess who likes strawberries?

bag of stuff (yes, it's a poop bag!)

walking

Daddy's Lowe's list and a dryer sheet are great toys

See how much fun they are?

Imagination Movers, her new fave

playing Xbox

teething

MumMum's Birthday

Yesterday I turned 30 and had the best day with Jill, and then dinner out with her and Steve at Anthony's.  We had a great time.  Here we are, reading a bedtime story in the late afternoon.  We were showing Daddy how we do it so he can read it at bedtime too.  Jill LOVES this book, and at bedtime she insists upon it being read multiple times.

pinching like lobsters

we just finished snapping like alligators

tickling like caterpillars, her favorite part

Happy 4th!

Jill had a great time yesterday. We took her to the swings at Westcrest Park, one of her favorite places. She waved goodbye to them with tears in her eyes as we were leaving.

my favorite shot of the day

another good one

"uh oooh"

kisses for Daddy

last 4th of July, with the marks from the tape 

still on her arm where it was splinted for her iv

(It took a couple of weeks and many baths to remove them.)